Pence: White House fully supports saying ‘radical Islamic terrorism’

Vice President Pence on Wednesday said the White House fully supports using the term “radical Islamic terrorism,” despite reports that the new national security adviser broke with Trump on using the phrase.

“We all fully support the naming of what it is that we face,” Pence said on MSNBC’s “For the Record with Greta.”

“On the campaign trail, President Trump was the first in that famous speech in Ohio, to name radical Islamic terrorism and say we need to bring the broadest range of resources to bear,” Pence said.

{mosads}Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster reportedly said in his first National Security Council meeting last week that employing the term is not helpful because terrorism is “un-Islamic.”

But Trump during his speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday still invoked the phrase.

“We are also taking strong measures to protect our nation from radical Islamic terrorism,” the president said. 

The phrase has its critics in the foreign policy and national security sector, including those arguing that using the term plays into militants’ recruiting efforts by portraying the U.S. as at war with Islam.

But the vice president doubled down on using the phrase Wednesday evening, arguing that a variety of tactics should be used to defeat groups such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

“Not just military, but also on the internet, also with our allies, also reaching out to moderate voices in the Islamic world to join us to eradicate radical Islamic terrorism from the world,” he said on MSNBC.